Catnip
by Mr Khan
Summary: Jill, Lethe, and Lyre. Aimee gets Jill a love potion for female cats, and Jill gets more than she bargained for. Shameless Yuri.


Catnip

By Mr Khan

_I write fan-fiction for both here and Deviantart, and my general rule is to keep the two separate. What appears here is more straight fan-fiction, while what goes over there tends to fall on the erotica side of the line. This one bridges the gap, and more importantly it's JillxLethe (and also Lyre), a genre I've found to be criminally underrepresented hereabouts. Enjoy._

This was wrong. This was wrong on so many levels. They had been committed racists on opposing sides, they had hated one another, wanted nothing more than to see each other and all their kindred destroyed, had hunted each other for sport. That fact alone made this inconceivable. The added layer, the fact that they were both female, made this beyond ludicrous. Jill Fizzart sighed as she scratched her wyvern behind the ears absently, staring at the object of her desire from across the camp. Yes, it was wrong, but there was nothing she could really do about it. She was just so beautiful, graceful, sleek, and lethal. Her confident, no-nonsense attitude was inspiring. Wait, had she seen her? No, she had just spotted Ike. Rumor in the army was that she had asked Ike to go stay with her and her people after the last war. Ike, fortunately, had spurned that advance for reasons best known to himself alone. Jill took her distraction as an opportunity to beat a hasty retreat. Her wyvern grunted, wanting her to scratch more.

She made her way to the mess and ate alone, again. Jill gave herself too little credit. Before she had become infatuated she had never put much stock in looks, but she was a striking figure herself. Her long red hair, done up in a ponytail as always, sat as the perfect mane to her soft face. Being of nobility, she had been sheltered from the advances of others, unaware of how striking she really was. She did little to accentuate her beauty, with her curves hidden under an unflattering set of red armor of the light kind favored by wyvern riders. When she could, Mist liked to eat with her, concerned that she still wasn't fitting in like she should, but Jill largely ate alone by choice. It is for that reason that Jill was quite surprised when someone came and joined her at her table.

"It's hard, isn't it?" a voice asked. Jill looked up from her food, curious. The voice belonged to Aimee, the merchant.

"Excuse me?" Jill replied.

"It's hard when you're in love with someone who barely knows you exist," Aimee said, smiling.

"What?" Jill yelped incredulously, blushing to a hue to match her hair and armor. "That… that's absurd," she said unconvincingly.

"Come on, honey," Aimee chided, "You're not fooling anyone. I saw you earlier, staring at her like a schoolgirl." Aimee chuckled, Jill was only in her late teens, after all.

Jill blushed an even deeper shade of red. "You aren't going to tell anyone, are you?"

"Of course not," Aimee replied, "I sympathize with you, like I said." For a second, just a second, Aimee glanced over at Ike, dining at the other end of the mess hall.

"But… it's forbidden," Jill added, "in more ways than one."

Aimee waved her hand dismissively. "The heart wants what it wants, right? Can't fight that." Aimee leaned over the table, closer to Jill. "You know," she said confidentially, "I can help you."

"With what?" Jill said, deciding to pretend as if this conversation wasn't happening.

Aimee flicked her in the forehead, "with Lethe. Since you're after her, I think I can help. One of my suppliers has come through with just the thing."

"How?" Jill asked. Against her better wisdom, hope leapt in her heart. But she was skeptical, of course. Classical literature told her that love was hard, and that there were no quick fixes.

"Being a Cat Laguz has its advantages, mostly sensory. They smell, hear, and see way better than we do, and are way better at getting buff than we are. But it comes with weaknesses, too."

"Like fire magic."

"Right. But think more obviously. She's a Cat…"

It had been a late night for Lyre. She had been given the second guard shift, the one from 10 to midnight. She had figured that she might as well just stay up straight through all of that. General Ranulf said that they should make a party of it, and so they did. All the Gallians traveling with the army: even Mordecai and Skrimir. Well, everyone except Lethe, at least. Her sister had been strangely moody recently, moody even by Lethe's standards. She had simply growled when Ranulf invited her to their shindig, saying that she needed a full night's sleep. The Gallians passed the time with barrack-room stories and alcoholic milk, much as Gallian soldiers were wont to drink.

When she thought about it, it was rather irresponsible of her to participate in such a party immediately before her guard shift, as when the others retired to their tents to sleep, she had to begin her prowl. She found it hard to stand on her own two feet in her human form: the milk must've gotten to her. Lyre shifted into her cat form. Her movements were smoother there, and she could see and hear more, all the better for guard duty. In the dead of night, she made her rounds.

It was a warm, clear early summer night. Perfect for a thin-skinned beorc, but for a laguz, it was highly distracting. There were insects and all kinds of nocturnal vermin out and about, and with Lyre's keen Cat senses all of these things were very prominent, masking the presence of potential foes. In situations like these, she relied on smell mostly. Real foes, either beorc or laguz, had distinctive scents that, on a windless night like tonight, she could pinpoint with lethal accuracy. The whole world was perfectly clear to her through her nose. Here was a mother bird resting on her nest, there were the peculiar pheromones of an ant colony. Floating on the still air from the camp came the pleasant smell of campfire smoke, and even more faintly, the smell of food, and also…

_Whoa. What is that?_ It had to be the most intoxicating aroma she had ever smelled. Even though it was this faint, it made her nose tingle pleasantly. Lyre thrust her nose to the sky, sniffing rapidly, wanting more of the smell, needing it. She paced around a little, and finally caught a stronger concentration of it. As she inhaled deeply, her heartbeat increased, blood surging around her body. She felt… hot. Hotter at least than she should have on the warm summer evening. She felt like she wanted to feel something, really rub up against it. She pawed at the ground desperately, flexing her claws. She inhaled deeply, then her whole body shook. No denying it now, she needed this smell. She turned about, caught the direction it was coming from, and bounded off, away from the camp. Her duty was forgotten, and only the smell drove her.

Jill sat just inside the light from her fire. She had snuck out of camp early on with a few things in tow, enough to make a fire and boil the potion that Aimee had given her. Jill was dressed oddly by her standards; wearing a loose-fitting pink pajama top that she carried around, but never used. _Catnip._ Jill had laughed when Aimee told her. It was different from regular catnip, Aimee had assured her, and Jill had no reason to doubt her: Aimee was an accomplished druggist. It was tailored specifically to work with Cats, rather than with Tigers or Lions. Furthermore, it was laced with the right Cat pheromones to make sure that it only drew female Cats. All the better: she was after Lethe, not Ranulf, and would rather not have to deal with him while amorous (he was irritating enough as it was).

Aimee had told her to apply the catnip liberally to her face, neck, arms, and chest. Jill found the latter of those a little too straightforward, but went with it anyway. Jill was then to put what remained of the potion in a kettle and boil it, helping to get the potion into a vaporous state and into the air. The catnip smelled a little acrid to her nose, and she hoped this was going to work, otherwise she was going to stink for no reason. No, she didn't hope this was going to work, she prayed for it. This had to work. Now that hope had been injected into her heart, she needed to have Lethe. Finally, snapping twigs heralded her arrival.

Jill had to act quickly. Lethe would be attracted to the catnip, Aimee had warned, so that meant that if Jill hadn't disposed of the boiling kettle full of it, the cat would go for the kettle as the main source of the catnip, and not for her. Ideally, Jill was supposed to drink it, to really get it_ in_ her, in her system. Then it would be on her breath, in her blood. Jill poured some into a cup and slurped it down. It was hot, and tasted worse than it smelled. She suppressed her gag reflex and drank a second cup. The rustling sounds grew louder. Jill needed to hurry, so she simply poured the rest of it all over herself. The cloth of her pajama top was drenched in the stuff, and suddenly became form-fitting, and embarrassingly translucent, if Jill had had the time to look at herself. She cast the kettle aside and sat back on the ground.

Lyre prowled through the forest. If she had been thinking properly, she would have noticed the fact that she was approaching a fire outside the camp. That would have been cause for alarm under normal circumstances, but the only thing in Lyre's mind was the smell, and her desire for it. She brushed and slid through undergrowth heedlessly, her paws snapping twigs and catching brambles, her upright tail making a racket as it simply brushed aside boughs, rattling leaves. Finally she found the source of the smell: this woman, she reeked of it.

Jill saw the cat coming. The coloring of the fur looked slightly off from Lethe, but Jill attributed that to the poor light from the fire, plus she could hear a bell gently ringing now that she was close: it had to be her. Jill stood and approached her. The cat moved forward and began eagerly brushing its body against her own. Finally, Jill summoned up her courage and asked:

"Lethe? Is that you?" The cat looked up at her, and morphed. What stood before her was a Gallian cat-girl with light brown hair. To Jill's dismay, however, the girl had a pink tunic, a pink collar with a pendant, and not a bell, clasped to her neck, and long black leather leggings. No. She had forgotten completely about Lethe's twin sister, Lyre.

"You," Lyre said, "you're that Daein-beorc. My sister told me about you." Her voice was thick with desire, she was breathing heavily.

Jill misinterpreted her tone and body language. Generally the laguz at least looked human when they were in their human form, but she could see the animal in her, not in the tail and remaining cat-ears, but in the feral look of her eyes, the way her half-open mouth bared her teeth, in her heavy breathing. Jill didn't have time to be scared, as Lyre launched herself at her before she could assess the situation. For a split second, Jill wondered if Aimee had been wrong, and she was about to be mauled.

The impact came, and Jill's fears were allayed, partly. Rather than attacking, Lyre wrapped her arms around Jill's body and locked into a tight embrace. Lyre was quite strong for her body size. She kissed Jill deeply, her tongue thrusting into Jill's mouth. Jill moaned in protest, her mouth too full of tongue to formulate words. She struggled in Lyre's embrace, and Lyre disengaged.

"Why are you resisting? You're the one who asked for this."

"Asked for what?" Jill replied.

Lyre sniffed Jill's face hungrily, then licked her cheek. "That smell. It's all over you." She kissed Jill's neck, pressing into it a little. "It means you want to mate." She licked Jill's lips, then kissed her deeply again. "I don't know how a beorc female is making this smell," she said as she emerged for a breath, "but I can't resist."

"But I was after Lethe," Jill admitted, trying to salvage the situation before things got completely out of control.

For a second, jealousy tinged Lyre's features, then she licked Jill's whole face, reveling in the taste and scent of it, then nibbled at her neck a little. "My sister? Doesn't matter. You make the smell in the presence of your designated mate. I smelled it. I'm your mate now." She knocked Jill to the ground, flat on her back. She placed her hands on Jill's breasts, causing her to blush again. She sniffed her chest from her navel on up, and when she arrived at the collar of her pajama top, she bared her fangs, preparing to rip the flimsy, catnip-soaked top off her designated mate's body. Jill was too confused to resist. A part of her enjoyed this, wanting Lyre as much as Lyre wanted her, enjoying Lyre's attentions. Lyre was close enough, right? But a part of her knew this wasn't right, that she was attracted to Lethe for something more than just mating, and it was wrong of her to involve Lyre in this. Lyre grabbed Jill's collar with her fangs, ready to tear the whole top off, when she was struck.

Lethe had awoken a few minutes before. She had been sleeping back in her tent in her cat form as she always did when she was agitated. The smell had overtaken her in her slumber and she had awoken: heart racing and full of desire. She tore off out of the camp and into the darkness.

The gold-furred mass hit Lyre at high speed, knocking her from Jill's body. Jill stood up quickly, trying to get away, but the new cat tackled her as well, bearing her back on her back, on the ground again. Her paws, claws extended, sat on either side of Jill's head. Jill looked up to see a fierce cat face staring back at her, teeth bared, breathing heavily. Again, fear of being mauled surged through Jill.

"Lethe, wait!" she shouted, closing her eyes. On opening them again, she still saw bared teeth, but a somewhat more comforting face. Short blonde hair, cat ears like her twin sister's, but with a green tunic, a green collar from which two bells dangled on two long green strings, and bare legs. Lethe's face was possessed of the same intense, feral gaze, which Jill now recognized.

"Foolish beorc," Lethe said scathingly. "Love is a more potent thing for us than you can comprehend." She leaned in and kissed her as well. "If you had been willing to go through more… normal courtship routes I might have been receptive." She rubbed her face against Jill's, sniffing rapidly, which devolved into another deep kiss. Nearby, Lyre stood back up.

"Instead," Lyre added, in that often-creepy way that twins can finish each others' thoughts, "You now have two mates." Lethe finished what Lyre had started, seizing Jill's shirt by the collar with her teeth and tearing it in two, heaving the torn rags away.

"What?" Jill yelped incredulously, self-consciously trying to cover her now-bare chest with her hands. Lethe's tail whipped out, wrapping behind Jill's neck. Her strong tail tugged, heaving Jill back onto her feet.

"It's natural," Lethe said. "Whoever catches the scent is your mate. It's not unheard of for Gallian males to take more than one mate." As she said that, Lethe stroked Jill's cheeks with her hands lovingly. Lyre came in from the left and shoved Lethe away slightly. Lyre hugged Jill from the left, and Lethe hugged her from the right. Both kissed her on the cheek.

"So now you have us," Lyre said.

"Both of us," Lethe finished. Again the two of them shoved Jill to the ground and descended upon her. Jill had learned her lesson too late: love was nothing to toy with.

End.


End file.
